1. Field of the Disclosure
The present disclosure relates to an apparatus and method for detecting a narrow road in front of a vehicle, and more particularly, for detecting a narrow road through which a vehicle cannot pass, based on detected positions of obstacles using a LiDAR.
In the present disclosure, a circular arc embodies an arc of a circle and a central point embodies a central point of the circle.
Further, in the present disclosure, a road embodies an alley, a general road, and the like, which can be defined without a lane.
2. Description of Related Art
Generally, a width of a road is designed to allow a vehicle to comfortably pass through.
However, when obstacles (e.g., other vehicles, and the like) are located at edge(s) of one side or both sides of a road, the width of the road becomes more narrow, such that a driver must pass through the road by visually judging the width of the road, while looking at the left and right sides of the vehicle.
As a result, when an actual width of a road is narrower than that of a vehicle body, a fender-bender with obstacles may occur due to an incorrect judgment by a driver.
To solve the above problems, there has been proposed a technology by which a width of a narrow road is sensed by mounting rotating sensors in a central part of the front of a vehicle body.
However, such a technology according to the related art detects a width of a narrow road by using a sensor which merely rotates to the left and right, and therefore may not accurately detect the width of the narrow road when the narrow road is, e.g., a curved line rather than a straight line.